


Shadows Before The Dawn

by the_moonmoth



Category: Stargate Atlantis
Genre: Future Fic, Gen, Minor Character Death
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2005-08-21
Updated: 2005-08-21
Packaged: 2017-10-14 09:18:05
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,592
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/147743
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/the_moonmoth/pseuds/the_moonmoth
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>'Are you okay?' he finally blurted out, and then rolled his eyes, 'Sorry, I mean, obviously you're not. But, um, do you want to talk about it?'</p>
            </blockquote>





	Shadows Before The Dawn

**Author's Note:**

> Unbeta'd.

Rodney reached the top of the north-west tower and took a moment to catch his breath, supporting himself with one hand against the smooth grey wall. The tower was one of the smaller ones ringing the city, so the climb hadn't been as bad as it could have been, but even so, his thighs burned with the exertion, breathing more laboured than he'd like to admit.

But she was up here somewhere, the only dot beyond the central area where the shield still functioned, and the need for personal space aside, she had to know that they couldn't leave her out here. Besides, Sheppard had made him promise.

Straightening up, McKay opened the door out onto the balcony and was immediately hit by the clarity of the air, the smell of salt and the light breeze; the clear night sky undistorted by the city's shield. Behind him, Atlantis's twisted spires reached like burn-blackened hands to the sky, and in front the ocean stretched to the horizon. He didn't see her straight away -- there were steps several metres ahead, leading down to a railing, and she sat on the bottom one, all but the top of her head obscured from sight.

'Teyla?' he called, walking over. 'You want to, ah, come back in now? Elizabeth's about to have a fit.'

She turned her head slightly in his direction but didn't answer. Rodney paused, made uneasy by her stiff body language, and she turned back out to the ocean. 'Teyla?' he asked again.

'Please tell Dr. Weir,' she said quietly, 'that I'm fine and will return to the shielded areas soon.'

Rodney fidgeted. 'I'm afraid you really need to come now. It simply isn't safe out here.'

'As I said,' Teyla repeated, enunciating each word even more precisely than usual, 'I will return in a couple of minutes.'

'Teyla-'

'Just a couple of minutes, Dr. McKay!' she snapped, half-turning towards him again, and Rodney stared in surprise for a couple of seconds before the realisation clicked into place that she was crying.

Crap. He was so not cut out for these kinds of things. And where was Sheppard when you needed his easy charm? Oh, right, lying in the infirmary with a bullet hole in his calf.

Over the years Rodney had taken pretty much everything the Pegasus galaxy had been able to throw at him, and had handled it admirably if he said so himself, but him and crying women -- just, no. He'd had several unfortunate experiences with ex-girlfriends and alcohol, and it just never turned out well.

But this was Teyla -- she was like family, and he felt like he should do something. Something that didn't involve quietly sneaking back inside until she was done. And Jesus, Teyla crying -- how wrong was that? In the grand scheme of this whole fucked-up galaxy, it suddenly seemed to Rodney to be deeply, unsettlingly wrong.

She let out a deep, shuddering breath and wiped at her face. 'I am sorry,' she said softly. 'My anger was not intended for you, Rodney.' She turned fully, caught his eye briefly. 'Please, sit, I could do with the company.'

He took a couple of tentative steps forward, and then down to the railing, and sat down next to Teyla on the bottom step, trying to think what to say. The silence stretched thinly between them, and McKay began to fidget again.

'Are you okay?' he finally blurted out, and then rolled his eyes, 'Sorry, I mean, obviously you're not. But, um, do you want to talk about it?'

Teyla smiled wanly into the wind, and, wiping at her face again, she turned her sharp, too-bright eyes on Rodney and said, 'No, not really.'

'Oh, good,' Rodney breathed, then catching her raised eyebrow he backtracked, 'I mean, you're welcome to if you want to of course, but it's good that you don't feel pressured...' he trailed off at her expression of quiet amusement, rendered oddly vulnerable through the moisture clumping her eyelashes together, and smiled dryly at himself. 'Sorry,' he said again. 'I'm not very good at this.'

'At what?' She withdrew a Kleenex from her pants pocket and blew her nose (and Rodney couldn't help thinking how out of place the oddly human gesture seemed on her), looking at him curiously.

'You know,' Rodney gestured vaguely between them. 'This.'

She cocked her head. 'Talking?' she asked with a small, incredulous laugh, unusually brittle-sounding.

'Yeah, funny, huh,' he said, and then, 'Oh, hey, is this about that man on the mission?' Teyla stared at him for a moment, and then rose suddenly, startling him, and walked to the railing. 'Because you were just doing your job,' he tried to say soothingly to her back, 'protecting the team from a very real threat.' She turned back to look at him and her face was awful, twisted and pale. It made no sense: 'It's not like you haven't-'

'He was just a child!' she cried. 'No more than sixteen years, and I killed him!'

'He had a gun!'

'He just wanted our food for his family,' she shot back, trying to turn away but Rodney was on his feet, grabbing her arm to stop her.

'You couldn't have known that,' he said. 'He shot Sheppard for God's sake. How were you supposed to react?'

'I should have... I didn't...' her voice cracked away and she swallowed, unshed tears wobbling dangerously in her eyes. 'Colonel Sheppard's injury was superficial. I should not have reacted with such force.'

This was stupid. She'd killed innumerable times before, defending the team and Atlantis -- they all had, and it was nothing to be proud of, but why should it be any different now? 'Teyla, for the love of -- this whole galaxy is at war, with the Wraith, with each other, and let's not even mention the Orii. If someone fires on an armed party they should expect-'

'Rodney he was *starving*,' she shouted angrily, yanking her arm away. 'He was not a real threat. He was just a child! Just a stupid, hungry child. For taking his life, how am I any better than a Wraith?'

Oh. Rodney stared at her, comprehension dawning. With her connection to the Wraith, and the years of relentless, semi-psychic dreams, that had to be her ultimate nightmare, didn't it. 'You're not a Wraith, Teyla,' he said forcefully. 'Nothing you could ever do would ever... You just aren't capable of it, okay? The comparison is ridiculous.'

'But I have never before taken the life of someone I did not feel was worthy of it.' She looked at him miserably, chest rising and falling with her rapid breathing, becoming ragged. 'He was just a child,' she repeated, her voice shaking, a small tremor that grew into a sob, and then she was crying for real, tears streaming down her face, sobs racking through her, and Rodney, watching in horror, felt his own throat tighten painfully.

'I am... _so tired_ ,' she whispered, her voice strangled, and he did the only thing he could think of.

'Hey,' he said, 'come here.' And Teyla, who had never needed anyone in all the time he had known her, allowed him to wrap his arms around her, maybe even welcomed it, and shook with grief and rage while he stroked her hair.

And while he did, he thought about the years since they'd met, and that he should have known that even through the horrors of what they'd lived through, despite the blood and gore on all of their hands, that Teyla would never lose her sense of what was right and wrong.

He thought of Sheppard, and how he used to look before the grey appeared in his hair and he still smiled. And Elizabeth, before she'd ever had to order someone to their own or someone else's death. And when exactly had he begun to see death as a normal part of his existence? Teyla had always had a line, and she had kept them all, even Sheppard, from crossing it. How awful, then, that it was her, at least to her own mind, that finally had.

It didn't last long, just a violent burst of emotion, and once she had calmed down again, Rodney felt compelled to say, 'We should probably head back to the shielded sections. Elizabeth's worried that we might be detected by one of those new stealth darts and the ZPM really can't handle another attack right now.'

Teyla, looking out over the railing again, asked, 'Do you ever think that the night is endless, Rodney?'

Rodney shrugged. A couple of years ago he would have told her to stop being so whimsical, that the planet spun on its axis at a constant angular velocity, causing precisely thirteen hours of darkness each night. Now, he just said, 'Sometimes.'

'There is an old story amongst my people,' she told him, 'of a man who wandered for many years, running so fast away from all that he feared that he kept pace with the world's turning, living always in darkness. I sometimes think that I have become that man.' She turned and walked back towards Rodney. 'Please,' she said. 'I need to see the sun rise.'

Rodney looked at her, looked into her eyes, and thought of Ford and Lorne, Carson and Radek; of fiery death and his own fear and the scream of a Wraith dart. 'Okay,' he agreed. She smiled and sat down next to him, leaning into him slightly, and he said, 'I think I need to see it, too.'


End file.
